While Major League Baseball officials gather in Houston this week to recognize baseball's efforts toward increasing diversity, Daryl Wade and his colleagues will work to get the job done at Sylvester Turner Park on the city's north side.

The city-owned park in Acres Homes is home to one of five MLB Urban Youth Academies, part of the sport's effort to promote participation across ethnic lines.

Wade estimates the Houston academy has offered free baseball lessons and equipment and instructional programs to more than 2,000 youngsters - about 65 percent blacks, about 20 percent Hispanics - ages 7 through 17 since opening in April 2010.

This weekend, in conjunction with MLB's Civil Rights Game on Friday at Minute Maid Park, the academy will host a tournament featuring 5- to 12-year-old participants in MLB's RBI - Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities - program, the competitive counterpart to the academy's instructional component.

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MLB launched its first academy eight years ago in Compton, Calif., in an effort to stall the decline in baseball participation by blacks. Only 8.1 percent of players on opening-day rosters were black (by contrast, 26.1 percent were foreign-born), and the NCAA says only 3.7 percent of 2012-13 baseball participants were black.

The RBI program has proved its worth in Houston since it was founded in 1989, providing an early showcase for future major league players Carl Crawford (Dodgers), Chris Young (Mets), James Loney (Rays), Michael Bourn (Indians) and Anthony Rendon (Nationals).

The academy, in terms of feeding the pipeline into college baseball and MLB, is a work in progress. Students from its initial class of 2010 will enter their senior year in high school this fall, and Wade hopes to count a handful as scholarship recipients - and, perhaps, MLB draft prospects - by this time next year.

Success can be measured in many ways, Wade said.

"Success is seeing kids' attitudes change," he said. "Our kids have better grades than their peers. We get a lot of respect from the community. And when we get one kid in school, that will be success for us."

But for parents such as John Aguon, who has two sons in the academy and RBI program, the investments by the Astros and MLB have paid dividends.

Case in point

Aguon said his son Cole, a sophomore lefthanded pitcher at Nimitz High School, was injured in a 2010 auto accident while the family was driving back from a baseball tournament in Colorado. The family looked for an alternative that would provide coaching with less travel and found the answer with Wade and the Urban Youth Academy.

"It has been a godsend, both physically and emotionally," Aguon said. "The coaching is as good as you can get from any tournament team. Cole got a chance to work with Chris Sampson, who used to pitch for the Astros. They have a lot of kids working at different levels, but Cole benefited from it. It's a chance to be around positive people."

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Aguon will play this summer on one of the Astros-sponsored RBI teams and with a team of Urban Youth Academy players from Houston and New Orleans that will participate in a Junior Olympics tournament in Florida.

Quality coaching

Outfielder Austin Alexis, 16, who moved with his family to Manvel from New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, said he hopes his scholarship chances will be boosted by his work at the academy.

"They've done a lot for me," he said. "A lot of kids don't want to stick around the game. But I love playing. They've helped me with pointers on hitting and stuff, keeping the weight on my back leg, learning not to lunge at the ball."

His father, Edgar Alexis, said the academy offers access to pro scouts that equals that drawn by many of the top select teams, and the academy and RBI programs pick up travel expenses that can cost hundreds of dollars.

"It gives a chance to kids that may not have had a chance to play otherwise," he said. "Baseball can be expensive, and the academy is a great place for kids to see what their potential is and whether the sport is worth pursuing.

"And I'm glad MLB is stepping up with this. We have such a rich history in baseball that our kids don't know about."

This is the first year the Astros have been in charge of the Houston RBI program (not to be confused with a separate charity, Recycled Baseball Items, which has been operating in Houston for several years) in addition to the Urban Youth Academy, which bears the name of former Colt .45s/Astros star Jimmy Wynn.

A joint venture with the city, Astros, MLB and the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, the academy and RBI programs have been augmented during Jim Crane's ownership of the Astros by the Astros Foundation Community Leaders Program, which hopes to spend $18 million over the next five years to renovate city-owned youth baseball and softball fields.

Popular programs

Wade, a former athletic director with the Aldine and Houston school districts, said the Houston academy operates Monday through Thursday and Saturday year-round. About 100 to 200 youths use the fields during any given week, and between 400 and 500 new academy members sign on each year, Wade said.

MLB says more than 200 players from academies in California and Puerto Rico have been selected in the first-year player draft, and commissioner Bud Selig said recently he was encouraged by academy efforts in both locations plus Houston and New Orleans.

"I am stunned at the number of draft choices that come out of Compton," Selig said. "We've really made progress. It's slow. Some things in life just take time, but you know you're doing the right thing, and I'm telling you that the academies in Compton and Houston are dealing with that problem."

The Houston academy and RBI programs have crowded summer agendas. The academy will sponsor a series of summer camps June 9 through July 11 that will include lessons on fundamentals and the sport's history.

RBI summer league play begins June 2, featuring 12 15-member baseball teams and six softball teams, with each team playing a 12-game schedule. All-star teams from each sport will advance to a regional tournament, with regional winners advancing to the RBI World Series in Arlington.

Houston won the 2010 baseball championship, and the Houston softball team lost to Atlanta in last year's title game.

Jack Frels, a retired federal prosecutor who has worked with the RBI program for seven years, said every member of the RBI all-star team he has helped coach during that time has played college baseball or earned a college academic scholarship.

"Anthony Rendon was on my first team in 2008, and the manner in which he conducted himself had such an impact on kids on that team that weren't as experienced or as mature," Frels said.

Big things to come

Wade hopes the Astros can expand the Houston RBI program to include Astros-sponsored junior leagues. Houston's two junior RBI programs are sponsored by St. Monica Catholic Church in the Acres Home area and by South Central Sportz Inc. at Sunnyside Park.

"The next year is going to be big for us," Wade said. "We have kids who are on the right track of getting an opportunity. Every time you give a kid a baseball, they become a fan. And when they see these colors, they become Astros fans.

"I grew up in Houston pulling for the Colt .45s, and I hope we can pass that same feeling on to kids and have them be fans for the rest of their lives."